Category Archives: Social Dialogues

The European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) and the European Cockpit Association (ECA)met with the Transport Commissioner Violeta Bulc and the Employment Commissioner MarianneThyssen for talks on the many and diverse social challenges facing the hundreds of thousands ofaviation professionals they represent. Following those discussions, ETF and ECA warmly welcomethe joint commitment made by the Commissioners to deliver a social package for aviation in 2018and to bring the Juncker Commission’s social pillar to life in the aviation sector.
Dirk Polloczek, ECA President, said: “For too long, aviation and its highly mobile workers have beentreated differently to other workers, with aviation’s often separate regime used to enable bogus self-employment, artificial temporary agency worker status or even ‘pay-to-fly’, where the pilot ends uppaying more to fly the aircraft than the passengers do for a seat. ”
Oliver Richardson, ETF Civil Aviation Section President, added: “We now see the EU wet-leasing rulesbeing used to break a lawful industrial action while putting safety and security at stake. The EU muststop practices that favour freedom of provision of services over workers’ rights. We need a cleardefinition of principal place of business in order to avoid letterbox companies as well as aconsolidated definition of home base ensuring proper application of labour law. At the same time, arevision of the Single Permit Directive is needed to extend its application to mobile workers inaviation and prevent social dumping in case third-country crewmembers work on board of EUregistered airplanes”.Against this background, ETF and ECA stand ready to assist Commissioners Thyssen and Bulc in anypossible way to help build aviation’s social pillar. Both organisations strongly hope that thecommitment of the Commissioners to deliver a social package for aviation will materialize in theform of strong and binding rules protecting European aviation professionals. This will contribute tothe overall aim to ensure level playing field in European aviation.

This week, the ETF headquarters hosted a marathon of important aviation meetings that set the agenda for the upcoming period. On Monday, the Steering Committee met to prepare the work of the Section. On Tuesday, the EASA Strategic Group discussed the changes of the legislative framework of the Agency, the internal structure as well as current rulemaking tasks.

This was followed by the meetings of the three Committees (Air Traffic Management, Cabin Crew incl. Pilot Working Group and Ground Staff) dealing with the specific issues for the individual groups. And on Wednesday, the whole Civil Aviation Section got together to deal with a heavy agenda relating to the defence of aviation workers’ rights. Among other things, it included a new and strong campaign on Ryanair that will be implemented in close cooperation with ITFaviation.

Finally, the ETF delegation is attending today (Thursday, 22 June) the Plenary meeting of the Civil Aviation Sectoral Social Dialogue.

Among the topics discussed, we have the changes on the employers’ side representation, the EASA Basic Regulation, Regulation (EC) 1008/2008 on air services or the consultation of the Civil Aviation Social Dialogue Committee.

Brussels, 8 June 2017ETF strongly opposes recommendations in Connected Aviation Packageattacking Air Traffic Controllers’ fundamental rightsAs part of its package entitled ‘Open and connected Europe’, the European Commissionannounced today its recommendations on the so-called service continuity, including measuresaffecting the right to strike. The European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) stronglydeplores this attempt to limit indirectly this fundamental right guaranteed by the EU Charter ofFundamental Rights by proposing measures such as individual notification, protection ofoverflights and air traffic peak periods.
The proposed measures significantly encroach the national sovereignty of Member States and contradict the Article 153 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union which clearly states that the right to strike is excluded from EU competencies. This article must be understood as a whole, including the way this right is being organised at national level.

Charles-André Quesnel, Chair of the ETF Air Traffic Management Committee, commented: “The aimof the proposed notification at individual level is to attack the collective power of trade unions and wecannot tolerate this. The proposed measures are in breach of EU Treaties and we reserve the right tochallenge them at the European Court of Justice.”

In an earlier study based on official EU data and entitled ‘Efficiency, capacity and growth in European aviation’, the ETF together with ATCEUC have demonstrated that while blaming the air traffic controllers, the airlines themselves are responsible for over 50 percent of flight delays in Europe. Furthermore, the study shows that guaranteeing minimum services, which are in place in several EU Member States, are an ineffective measure.
The ETF is also reserved on the proposal to guarantee 100 percent of overflights in countries affected by industrial action and to use air traffic controllers from other countries as strike-breakers. Apart from the fact that this would circumvent the right to strike, it may also have serious safety consequences due to the lack of sector-specific training for these “universal” controllers.François Ballestero, ETF Political Secretary for Civil Aviation, added: “It is regrettable that theCommission is copy-pasting measures proposed by the lobby organisation of the European airlines.Under the populistic pretext of passenger protection they once again give preference to profit beforepeople. Instead of attacking fundamental rights we urge the Commission to propose recommendationsto the airlines to create quality jobs instead of installing social dumping all over Europe.”

FTTUB president received support from the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions in Bulgaria (CITUB); European Parliament’s support is also expected.

Bulgaria should urgently support the position of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) before the vote on the final version of teh Agreed Conclusions of the 61st session of the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations, which is currently taking place in New York. This is what FTTUB President and International Transport Federation (ITF) vice president Ekaterina Yordanova pleaded in a letter to Bulgarian prime minister Ognyan Gerdzhikov. Прочети още →

The Federation of Transport Trade Unions in Bulgaria (FTTUB) firmly retains its position against the concession of Sofia Airport in any form. This time, FTTUB reacted to the announcement made on March 21, 2017 that the Minister of Transport, Information Technology and Communications Christo Alexiev has issued an order terminating the concession procedure.

“We recognize the fact that the Ministry of Transport has taken into account some of our arguments against the concession. We also appreciate the fact that the President of the Republic of Bulgaria Rumen Radev shares our concerns related to the potential national security risks arising from a concession of Sofia Airport. However, we did not hear an official government statement that the state would retain its leading role in the management and development of the largest national airport.”
The full text of FTTUB position follows: Прочети още →

On 9 – 10 February 2017, the ETF together with ACI Europe and Airport Services Association co-organised a workshop on training and quality standards in ground handling. This event is part of an EU co-financed project in the framework of social dialogue. http://fttub.org/ground-handling-social-dialogue-support/

As a starting point of the debate, STC-Group (consultant of this project) presented the results of their desktop research and case studies in the selected countries. This was followed by the presentation of the views of the individual organisations and a debate with the audience.

The three organisations agreed to explore possible common grounds on the revision on the EASA Basic Regulation as well as preparatory work for the assessment of the Directive 96/67/EC on ground handling services. The final conference presenting the outcome of the project will take place on 28 – 29 April 2017 in Copenhagen.

The Social Partners representing employers and workers in the European Ground Handling – ACI Europe (ACI), Airport Services Association (ASA) and European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) – met on 8 and 9 December 2016 in Barcelona to discuss the issues of market access and social conditions in the ground handling industry. This workshop was part of an EU co-financed project in the framework of social dialogue.

The aim of the project is to prepare social partners’ views in light of the assessment of the Directive 96/67/EC that was announced as part of the Commission’s Aviation Strategy for Europe. Before the workshop, an extensive research has been conducted by the consultant company Syndex consisting of desktop and questionnaire research.

The participants agreed that market opening without social regulation has caused excessive pressure both on the ground handling companies and workers. There is a need for rules that will ensure level playing field and binding social protection for the workforce.

Therefore, all the three organisations will continue their joint efforts to have a sustainable and fair ground handling sector. The next workshop taking place in February 2017 will look at quality and training standards. Finally, the closing conference in April 2017 will present the outcome of the project to a wider audience.

FTTUB was represented at the workshop by its International Relations and Civil Aviation expert Antonia Panayotova who is also a member of the Steering Committee of the project, as well as by Petranka Shomova, a chairman of FTTUB’s trade union organisation at Varna Airport and by Albena Vasileva from FTTUB’s organisation at Sofia Airport.

Trade Unions are fully determined to eliminate violence against women through collective agreements, and their proper implementation with employers, at national, sectoral and company levels.

In a ground-breaking, and unpublished, study ‘Safe at Home-Safe at work’, which will be presented in Madrid on November 24-25 to mark the International Day against Violence against Women (November 25), the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) will reveal how trade unions in Europe have addressed violence against women at work and how support at the workplace can help eliminate violence against women at home.

The ETUC is hosting the Madrid conference to share experience of negotiations and agreements at company and sectoral level to combat violence against women and sexual harassment at work.

A survey carried out by the British TUC found that more than half of all women, and nearly two-thirds of women aged 18 to 24, experienced sexual harassment at work. A French survey, carried out in 2014, found that 1 in 5 women had been a victim of sexual harassment.

Such agreements will guide future European trade union actions to eliminate violence against women at work.

The 2007 European Framework Agreement on Violence and Harassment at Work between the European trade union and employers’ organisations led to Europe-wide agreements in the commerce, private security, local government, health and education sectors.

“Sexual harassment at work is a serious problem which can have far-reaching repercussions for the victims and impacts on the whole workplace,” said Montserrat Mir, Confederal Secretary of the ETUC. “Together with the employers, we have the means to address it effectively through collective agreements, as our study shows.

“A new negotiating issue for trade unions and employers is how victims of violence at home can be supported in the workplace. Domestic violence often follows victims into the workplace, and obviously impacts on productivity and workplace morale. This makes domestic violence a trade union issue.”

Violence against women in the workplace and the acts of domestic violence with all their impact on working life are the two main focus areas of the research within the project of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) “Safe at Home, Safe at work”. The President of FTTUB Ekaterina Yordanova, vice president of the ETUC Women’s Committee is a member of the steering group once again. The project covers 11 EU countries and Bulgaria is one of them.

From July 6th to 9th, the independent researcher of the project Jane Pillinger held a series of meetings in Sofia. Прочети още →